interslavic community

3. definite and indefinite article

In the Neoslavonic language (as well as in all Slavic languages, Latin and Greek, for example) there is no indefinite article (a, an). Innormalsituations, we speak without anyindefinite article. In specialcases, when we strongly need to express our unfamiliarity to an object, it is possibleto use thestandard numeral "one" (m. jedin, f.jedna, n. jedno) or the indefinite pronoun "some, any" (m. niekaky, f. niekaka, n. niejake).

English definite article "the" corresponds to the Neoslavonic demonstrative pronounm. toj, f. ta, n. to. This demonstrativepronounmust be declined in 7 cases and 3numbers,asyou can seelater. However, you shouldknow thatthe Neoslavonic definite articleis used only in clauses where we want to refer somethingalready existedin previous clauses. This is the sameplacewhere English prefersto use pronouns "this, that, these, those".Rememberthat Neoslavonic definite articledoes not serveto distinguish whether a word is a structured noun or something else. Neoslavonic has the syntheticgrammar, which is able to ensure this necessary information by another grammatical elements.The roleof the definite article in Neoslavonic is only and only referential. In othersituations, the definite article is not used. From thisperspective,It seems to English-speakingobserversthat Neoslavonic (and other Slavic languages as well) generally does not contain definite articles.

The exception to this statement arethe Slaviclanguages​​ having a reductionof declension of original 7 cases.This is theBulgarianand (Slavo)Macedonian. These two languages use their definite article in (almost) the same way as English, but please remember, that Bulgarian and (Slavo)Macedonian definite article is spoken after the word and written together. For example: "a woman" = žena, "the woman" = ženata.

This is very similar to the archaic word order: noun-article-adjective being different from the modern word order: article-adjective-noun. (e.g. modern ta dobra žena = the good women, corresponds to the archaic Old Church Slavonic: žena ta dobra) In addition, it is good to know that You can meet the old noun-article-adjective order in Polish.

Moreover, someSlaviclanguages ​​(southern languages and Czech) have yet anotherspecialty, which is existence of definite and indefinite adjectivesthat slightly differby suffixes.This very detail coming from the Old Church Slavonic is not incorporated into Neoslavonic.